Building Your Own Kitchen Cabinets ?

[Alf]

Thanks Alf. When I looked at your number of posts, and I'm glad I was sitting down at the time,

Cheeky

I noticed that you've been demoted from a Master Cabinetmaker to a lowly mod. :shock:

What's with this lowly business? :shock: :-s Mods are only one letter away from divinity... :wink:

Cheers, Alf

 

[jasonB]

I use 18mm MFC(melamine faced chipboard) for my carcases, usually white but sometimes wood grain depending on the door colour, backs are 12mm MFC.

Basic box construction, joined wirg biscutes and held together with "powerdrive" screws fron screwfix.

As the others have said the good thing about making your own is that you are not restricted to standard carcase sizes and filling the gaps with filler strips. If you plan to use some of the vast amount of wirework that is available remember that this is designed for the standard sizes of carcase with 18mm sides, any other combination will need packers and the internal depth of the carcase should not be less than 500mm.

Only the 3 wall units in this kitchen were standard widths

https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=4542

Jason

 

[cambournepete]

Sides fixed to base with glued butt joints, screwed roughly every 6-8" from the outside.

(This sort of thing

How do you keep the box off the floor?

I'm not trying to be thick here, but if you put legs under the base and not the sides don't you pur a lot of strain on the screwed butt joint? Any enlightenment you or John E could shed would be most welcome - a friend is in the process of deciding how to build his own kitchen at the moment.

Cheers,

Pete

 

[Aragorn]

Hi Pete
The legs actually bridge the join between the base and side, so both are supported.
When it's all glued up it's very strong - the units are also fixed to the wall and to each other. The worktop (granite in this case) is bonded everywhere too.

All in all, it is a very solid construction, which you can really feel when you use it.

 

[jedmc571]

Hello All,
Looks like this could be an interesting subject post, I imagine we've all considered building our own kitchen, but it's a big undertaking.
I'm looking for my next house and have decided that it's the option for me.
Interesting to see the different construction methods, simple box carcass sound good to me, it's great watching Norm putting together with dadoes
but as were all aware we don't have that facility, and besides it's even more time consuming.
I like the idea of pocket screwing, but also biscuit jointing (don't have a pocket jig yet ) but again is it as easy to butt joint glue and screw ?
I also like the suggestion of a pre finish for moisture protection, and I will probably use a rub on oil for speed.
Now here's the biggy ! Natural Wood or MDF ?
Pro's & Con's..................?
Worktop ? It would seem a shame to build your own kitchen and lump a piece of laminate worktop on it, so Solid Timber or Granite ?
I drove past a granite workshop in Cannock, they had loads of big pieces sat about, has anyone ever enquired at a place like this ? obviously worktop suppliers make their money selling the finished article, but it would nice to get someone at a granite yard to qoute for it ?
Keep posting all tips welcome

regards

Jed

 

[wizer]

with regards to what worktop to use, i'd say it is a personal thing. I like both granite and solid timber. But would never put an off the shelf laminate on the cupboards id sweated designing and and building.

 

[Aragorn]

I'm not sure about solid wooden worktops.
However beautiful they may be (obviously a question of taste), they don't strike me as being a very suitable material for a kitchen worktop.
There's also the maintenance issue.

Granite on the other hand seems such a suitable choice...?

I'd also be interested to hear what others think. Anyone had a solid wooden worktop for some years? How's it holding up? Is it a practical choice for a kitchen?

 

[wizer]

I think if you choose to have a wooden worktop you have to be prepared for the odd burn mark and 'ding'. Personally I think that wooden worktops age really well as long as they are treated correctly. 'Butcher's Block' island units are fashionable atm in kitchens. Real butcher's blocks take an incredible pounding and are prolly not everyones cup of tea, personally i like them.

 

[jasonB]

I try to steer my clients away from solid wood around sinks and hobs/ranges and use granite in these areas if not the whole kitchen. If they do want to go all solid wood I leave them some worktop oil & a sctotchbrite pad for touch-ups & regular re oiling.

Did a solid beech one for my brother about 5yrs ago and it looks manky around the sink and drainer nasty grey colour. There are also odd burn marks here & there.

Jason

 

[Dewy]

After Wolfs post about varnishing (yuck) on the ATT forum I may try the one he said about on a test piece.
Marine varnish not yacht varnish which is used on internal yacht surfaces and is food safe.

 

[tim]

The first kitchen I built was mine and it has a beech top.

It is 6 years old and gets regularly oiled but it still has gone a bit manky to one side of the sink. We put it in because we simply couldn't afford the price we were being quoted at the time for granite/ marble.

I would always recommend non wooden surfaces where water was involved although apart from that one area it is fine and looks good.

Cheers

Tim

 

[Anonymous]

Likewise, I built my own kitchen in our last home. I was a student at the time and perpetually skint. The carcases were constructed from T&G chipboard flooring, scavenged from a skip, cut to size using my old Skil circular saw. Once edged with iron-on edging tape and painted with white floor paint, from the same skip, they looked just fine.
I bought the doors from a salvage yard. These doors were water damaged hardwood cabinet doors from one of the major DIY chains. A lick of the scavanged floor paint and they were 'as good as new.'
I would love to have the space to build a kitchen from scratch again. We installed a flat-pack kitchen 5 years ago, and it has been due for replacement now for about 2 of those 5.

Long live all skip arabs!

 

[woodshavings]

I have just finished a revamp to our kitchen using granite tiles for the worktop. It looks great and is an excellent top but one word of warning. Granite is etched by strong acids such as lemon juice. I just could not understand where the white blotches on the black granite were coming from until I traced it to the splash from lemons being sliced. Good job I had used tiles so I could swap out the marked ones! I have now sealed the granite but we are now very careful to mop up any splashes.

John

 

[Jake]

My parents have had varnished pine worksurfaces in the kitchen my father built for over 25 years, with one re-polyurethaning in the interim. No problems with it at all, although it looks characterfully nice, rather than pristinely gleaming. Helped by the fact that they have a massive double drainer double bowl sink that must be 8 feet long. So not much water gets on the worktops.

I'm going to follow suit when we renovate our kitchen, save with iroko. I hate granite for some irrational reason - too shiny, hard and glitzy.

 

[Aragorn]

I hate granite for some irrational reason - too shiny, hard and glitzy.

Hi Jake
Did you see the granite in the kitchen I did recently?
It is "honed" instead of polished and it is far removed from being hard-looking, shiny and glitzy!
It has a soft sheen and would suit a "cottage" kitchen style very well IMO

 

[smiffy]

I used to make kitchens in a factory. All carcasses made of 15 MFC and they were all just boxes as most of you have said.

I have had to re-enforce many flatpack carcasses as they are just...crap!

Making them for myself, I always used just MDF, screws and glue. (I am not a master craftsman ) Simple shelf bearers under both mid and bottom shelves and a 12mm MDF back panel made a very solid if heavy box. The bottom shelf bearers in any carcass greater than 600mm or any appliance housing needs to go all the way to the floor. Unless you are using legs as mentioned. An extra mid bearer/leg is needed on a carcass greater than 600mm.
As we all know it is the doors that make the kitchen and this is where I put most of my time and meagre skills to try and make something half decent.

As long as you are aware of the stress and strains that a carcass will be subjected to, and reenforce as neccessary then we should be OK.
All obvious stuff, but I have seen 1000mm wall units full of tins and crockery fall and smash to the floor(not my work :shock and appliances drop through the shelving in a tall unit because supposed professional kitchen fitters forgot about stresses.

My latest kitchen is a year old now and looks as good as when I finished it.
I have re oiled the solid wood worktop once. The only thing I would say is that a good solid chopping board is essential to save the worktop. And my wife will tell you that I am far too over protective of any harsh use. As she says, a kitchen, especially certain areas of a worktop will get heavy use so it is inevetable that it will not stay pristine.

Cheers,
Ray.

 

[Dionmayland]

this site might help with the layout planning http://blog.armchairbuilder.com/categor ... remodel-2/ as well as a few ideas on how to construct it

 

[caroleb]

Got a feeling he may have finished by now..........

:lol:

Caz

 

[Tom K]

Got a feeling he may have finished by now..........

:lol:

Caz

But it's not even ten years not everyone is in a rush to finish.

 

[Benchwayze]

Yep... Well... I almost fell for the 'bump'! Even I don't take that long over a kitchen... Errr.. No wait... Maybe I do! :lol: